HEART OF GLASS
CHAPTER THREE !
[ season one, episode five ]
When the RV came to a spluttering stop, everyone in the vehicles behind assumed the very worst.
Jim hadn't made it.
He had turned.
The fever had got him.
But they were wrong. Thankfully, it was due to the radiator hose causing problems that needed to be fixed before their journey could continue. Sage — having already seen the smoke billowing from the engine before the vehicle came to a halt — grabbed Dale's mechanical kit and grinned in success; Dale merely gestured an order for her, and Glenn, to help. When everyone else hopped out of the designated cars and gathered in the middle of the desolate road, Marley joined Jacqui in the back to check up on the fever-stricken patient.
She wished she hadn't.
He was coughing vehemently. Every inch of colour had drained from his sunken face. His wrinkles had suddenly become far more prominent, and sweat was dripping from his forehead, despite his frozen limbs trembling.
He looked like one of the undead — and Marley would've believed he was if it wasn't for the dark blue still swirling in his eyes.
"Jacqui . . ." Marley shook her head. She couldn't speak; the words had dried up on the tip of her tongue.
Jim hacked and, with a grimace, ran a shivering hand over his sodden hairline.
The woman beside Marley held a hand to her chest. "This is the worse he's been the entire trip." Jacqui murmured quietly, her voice wobbling. She looked to the adolescent beside her with downcast eyes. "I don't think he can take much more, Mar."
She was right. Unfortunately, Jacqui was so right that it made Marley feel positively sick.
In fact, she couldn't think of anything to say in response other than, "I know." but Jacqui understood, regardless. And the gaping void in Marley's chest swelled. It grew and grew and grew until it felt like her heart was going to combust beneath the overbearing pressure. It urged her to turn away, leave and never return, unable to look at the dying man for a second longer.
Death was becoming a common reoccurrence, but it didn't make witnessing it in the flesh any easier.
She stepped out of the RV hastily, and immediately everyone paused mid-way through their conversation to look at her with wide eyes.
"It's Jim," she said, confirming the group's worst assumptions. "The fever . . . He can't take much more."
With a solemn nod from Rick, a melancholy Marley moved out of the doorway and granted him access inside. He patted her shoulder supportingly on his way — which didn't really help soothe her sorrow. The silence that followed it was torturous. Lori's fingers found her chin as she paced back and forth, Shane stared at the ground, Glenn offered Marley a comforting yet sympathetic smile, and T-Dog shook his head miserably.
Sad to say, Jim came to a decision rather soon.
With help from Shane, Rick carried the sick man from the RV and helped him sit beneath a shady tree on the outskirts of the dim forest beside the highway. Atop his head, his cap sat lopsided, and the pink crescents beneath his eyes had darkened considerably.
"Oh, hey," he murmured, looking up at the thick brambles overhead. "Another damn tree."
Marley bit down on her wobbling lip.
Fresh scars bloomed over old wounds.
She watched as everyone said their piece. Shane, Rick, Jacqui . . . even Andrea, who hadn't really spoken to Jim much before hand. The children ran to their mothers and sobbed. Sage buried her head in the Marley's chest so Jim wouldn't see her tears. But Marley refused to cry — she wanted to stay strong.
Everyone eventually drifted away, hopping back into vehicles with heavy hearts. When it came to Marley, she wasn't sure what to say.
Jim noticed her hesitance and looked up at her with glassy eyes. "Are you gonna remember what I said, kid?"
Marley recalled their earlier conversation from yesterday, when the group first learned he was bit in the attack and she led him somewhere quiet to regain a sense of normality. He told her not to blame herself when things go wrong — which, at the time, was something she desperately needed to hear. Even now, it was something she needed to hear. So she nodded and crouched low.
"I am." she replied, sniffing softly. "Of course I am."
Instinctively, the girl reached out and readjusted his hat so it would sit correctly on his head. A small smile graced her peony lips, and once again Jim looked into the face of a familiar ghost.
It was his son. Marley reminded him so damn much of his son. The youngest one . . . far too innocent for this treacherous world, taken in the most horrific way. Their smiles were the same — wide and warm, resembling a hot-summer's day.
In this particular scenario, it was the blissful smile of death.
He tipped his head forward pointedly, "You keep smilin,' kid. Don't let this world drag you down, alright?"
Again, Marley nodded. "Alright."
When it was Sage's turn, she leaned toward the man and placed a tender kiss on his cheek. When she pulled away, Sage pressed the tips of her fore-fingers and thumbs together, forming a bow shape, and looped them through the air until her pinky fingers grazed one another.
Marley understood the sign language and translated it, tears glistening in her eyes.
"She said family."
Jim couldn't help but smile. Using the last of his ebbing strength, he weakly reciprocated Sage's hand movements.
"Family."
That was the last he saw of the Whitman sisters. That was the last he saw of anyone. He couldn't even bring himself to watch the string of cars drive away — nor look into the faces of those pressing their faces against the glass — so he stared up at the pale blue sky as the low rumble of engines faded into silence, leaving him alone.
He closed his eyes and listened to the birds whistling their upbeat, yet somehow melancholy, tunes. The wind tousled his hat to the side, but his remaining strength to attempt to fix it had dissipated . . . and he couldn't bring himself to care. The breeze felt nice.
At long last, Jim was ready to greet Death like an old friend.
✧.｡. *.
There it was.
The CDC stood, in all of its glory, like a never ending banquet supplied before the ravenous group. Weapons in hand, they jumped out of the vehicles and made a beeline toward the enormous building pulsating with a distinct aroma of hope — it was the building they prayed would supply them with hope. God knows they all needed it.
Marley gripped her knife tightly and followed along behind the others. Sage was clutching the bottom of her sister's navy shirt, adrenaline pumping through her veins, but not enough to fuel her with the same bravery Marley portrayed. Never. She clenched her jaw. The dull thrum of white noise shrieking in her ears drowned out the sharp gasps of the people surrounding her.
Piles upon piles of bodies were sprawled across the ground.
Marley grimaced. The pungent smell of decay clung to her senses, flies buzzed around the sunken and rotted eyes of the dead, brain matter was splattered along the pavement and . . . the CDC looked to be victim to a hefty amount of bloodshed. It was in darkness, barricaded to avoid walkers entering. Not a soul lingered nearby.
And these people . . . they hadn't been bit — well, most of them hadn't. Instead, their heads were blown open, jaws unhinged and hanging on by torn tendons, bullets caving jagged holes through their foreheads. Pistols with empty magazines were melded between their limp fingers.
When she realised how they had died, Marley's grimace warped into a gag.
"Come on," Shane ordered with an expeditious lilt to his gruff voice. "Keep movin'"
Tearing her eyes away from the sight, Marley did as the man said, gesturing for Sage to reciprocate. Gingerly, they all approached the building with an overwhelming amount of caution. Marley stepped over a small cluster of bodies, refraining from gawking until her eyes burned with hot tears of disgust. She pushed Sage behind her and flicked the blade out of her silver butterfly knife.
There was a substantial clump of corpses by the shuttered doorway, dumped atop a sticky pool of crimson.
Sage turned her head away.
"Don't look." said Lori from the back of the group, urging Carl to keep his darting eyes away from the mangled human remains.
It was an impossible task. The gruesome sights were not intriguing to the human eye, not even in the slightest. It was more the fact everything was just there — nothing could prepare them for it, and averting their gaze was not something that could be done as easy as it was said. Certainly not for the children, and certainly not for the adults.
When they reached the sealed entrance, Rick and Shane hastily tried the locks. Everyone watched in anticipation. Perhaps this was their chance. Somewhere safe to stay, away from the walkers and the death and the horrible stench of decay and rot. A place where they could find answers, more people. This was it.
But it was not to be.
The doors wouldn't budge. Shane tried to slide the aluminium sheet upwards, but it remained planted as if sealed with indestructible glue. Rick hammered his fist against the doors, desperately searching for an alternative way in, but echoes of his hands clashing against metal quivered across the otherwise silent foyer.
Marley's hope deflated.
There had to be someone in there. There had to be.
Sage tapped her sister on the shoulder. Her dewy emerald eyes were bulging with fear and panic, and her hands moved frantically — so fast Marley could barely make out what she was trying to communicate.
"It's a dead end," Sage signed, logically. "Nobody stayed here when Atlanta fell."
As much as she didn't want to believe Sage was right, Marley nodded in hesitant agreement.
T-Dog, too, had noticed their unfortunate predicament. "There's nobody here."
"Then why are these shutters down?" Rick countered breathlessly, a newfound feeling of anger that was directed solely at the world cursing his bloodstream.
"Walkers!" Daryl yelled, alerting the group. He raised his crossbow and fired a singular arrow. It whistled through the air and plunged through an approaching walker's skull. More were coming. They were running out of time.
Sage's limbs shook with a mixture of fear and adrenaline. Marley held her close, pushing herself forward in the line of fire.
"You led us into a graveyard!" Daryl added heatedly, reloading his crossbow.
"He made a call." Dale assured, although his wary tone of voice betrayed him.
Daryl pointed at Rick accusingly. "It was the wrong damn call!"
"Shut up!" Shane seethed. "Just shut up! Shut up!" He marched right on over to Daryl and shoved him backward. The redneck surprisingly didn't do anything rash. "Rick, this is a dead end."
"Where are we gonna go?" Carol cried from the back, holding Sophia close. The little girl was sobbing uncontrollably, watching the stumbling walkers fearfully.
"She's right," Lori said, her breathing clipped and ragged. "We can't be here. Not this close to the city after dark."
They were out of luck this time around.
"Fort Benning, Rick. Still an option." Shane urged.
"On what?" Andrea implored shakily. "No food, no fuel. That's 100 miles."
"Hundred twenty-five, I checked the map." Glenn added, which didn't help the group's accelerating anxiety in the slightest.
Marley watched as T-Dog cocked a shotgun and pointed it at a walker's head. Daryl followed suit with his crossbow, but they didn't fire a shot. Not yet. Wasting ammo was a last resort.
"Forget Fort Benning!" Lori panted. "We need answers tonight! Now!"
Sage looked at Marley expectantly. It was too much to digest, so the girl simply shook her head and stuck a finger in the air to tell her answers would be a minute. A while. God, would they even get any?
Light was slipping away. Time was, too.
"Come on, let's go."
"We need to leave!"
"Move it!"
Rick didn't budge as everyone around him huddled together and stepped over the pile of rotting corpses. Lori was desperate for her husband to come to his senses, anyone could see that, but he wanted to believe the CDC was going to help. He wanted to believe they were going to get answers, a place to stay, a cure. People who could help.
Marley shook her head and looped an arm around Sage, tugging her along.
"Everyone, back to the cars!" Shane demanded. "Let's go! Move."
"The camera," Rick exclaimed all of a sudden, pointing up at a small surveillance camera stuck to the ceiling. "It moved!"
Nobody advanced toward the cars for a split second. They stared up at the inanimate camera — a sudden anger at Rick's restlessness blooming in their chests. Marley explained the situation to Sage, and the girl peered up at the camera with furrowed brows. She didn't believe it, either. Nobody did.
Perhaps Rick was losing his marbles.
"You imagined it," Dale said.
Rick shook his head. "No, it moved."
He stepped forward, watching and waiting for the camera to budge or swivel again so he could prove what he saw. Shane was the first to break the news, "It's an automated device, man. It's gears, okay? They're just winding down. Now, come on!"
He grabbed Rick's arm and forcefully pushed him away from the doors.
"It's dead, man! You need to let it go!"
Rick fought his way out of Shane's grip and slammed his hands against the aluminium. It rattled loudly, rumbling across the foyer like a thunder storm, surely drawing the attention of the walkers nearby. Sage couldn't hear it, but she could imagine the severity such a racket would create here in Atlanta city.
Marley winced at the reverberating clatters . What was he doing?
"Rick, there's nobody here!" Lori shrieked, her voice raw with desperation.
"I know you're in there!" Rick yelled at the camera. "I know you can hear me. Please, we're desperate. We have women, children, no food. Hardly any gas left —"
Lori pleaded with her husband, but he continued gesturing to a still camera. He was talking to the ghosts haunting the CDC. It was, in a way, terrifying to witness the man break when he had held it together for so long.
"We have nowhere else to go!"
He pounded against the doors again.
"If you don't let us in, you're killing us!" Rick cried, continuing to punch the sheet of vibrating metal. "You're killing us! Please! You're killing us!"
Shane had to physically restrain his comrade, looping an arm around his middle, and yank him away from the sealed doors. He continued yelling, screaming, pleading . . . the others watched with wide eyes and slackened jaws, shock rendering them almost completely immobile.
"You're killing us!"
Marley sobbed into her sleeve, holding Sage close to her side as they waited for Rick to join them.
"You're killing us!"
Shane shoved him toward the group.
It was time to go.
Just then, however, a high-pitched squeal erupted from the entrance. The metal grate was opening, fast. Light flooded out of the building, almost resembling the gateway to heaven, giving them access to a safety net.
It was almost unbelievable: the door had opened.
⋆.ೃ࿔*:･
i always think about what might've happened
to jim. like, obviously he turned but
where did he go after? was he killed? is
he still stumbling around somewhere?
honestly, i have no idea.
anyways, nearly done with season 1!
i'm excited! season 2 is gonna be
a good one to write